Security, Fire & Electrical Safety thru Common Sense not Political Correctness.
Those who don't study the past will repeat its errors.

"The Building is the Enemy Know the Enemy" -- Late-Francis Brannigan (Father of Modern Construction knowledge for the Fire Service and Friend)

Remember The fire Service is its on worst enemy- Nick Markowitz Jr.

Sunday, March 5, 2017

You should be able to get 15 Amps out of a 120 volt 15 Amp Wall outlet WRONG UL and NFPA once again cause confusion for public

I have a customer who distributes and delivers various oils and fluids to customers such as repair garages and industrial users of oils.

One of the products they deliver is DEF or Diesel Exhaust Fluid used in modern diesel vehicles to keep soot down.
They have a pump which draws 14.5 amps so there maintenance man who looked at it and see it draws 14.5 amps would think OK I can plug it into a 15 amp electrical outlet and be OK
except when he does he keeps tripping the breaker . Thats when they called me in and I had to explain to him the idiocy of the NFPA and National Electrical code and show him where he was wrong
because 99% of the population who are not electricians would get it wrong as well Because when NFPA and UL sat down and designed 15 amp Outlets they designed those circuits to only be used at 80% of its rated name plate . so that means no more than 12 amps continuous can be drawn thru the outlet not the full 15 which is for short bursts when a motor starts up.

In realty this motor must be run on a 20 amp circuit using number 12#gauge wire instead of 14# guage which is used for 15 amps.

because of this confusion the NFPA and UL has blood on its hands by not fully explaining to the public that 15 amps from a receptacle can not be used continuously and it gets plenty of people killed yearly when they plug in electric space heaters.

So why all the confusion good question you would think when an organization publishes safety standards they would take into account the general public's safety and NFPA and UL have failed miserably doing so. Just Like with the new close your bedroom door which if you do not have daisy chained smokes will get you killed.

Of course NFPA and UL blows off the whole code thing with its for professionals to use and educate the public. Wrong you make the code you should be the one informing people.

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-----------------------------------The purpose of this blog is to provide comment and information on a wide variety of issues relating to Fire, Security, Electrical, Safety,Communications , Good Trade Practice and Consumer Issues References will be provided using National Electric Code (NEC) , National Fire Protection Assoc.( NFPA) , ICC , ADA as well as other code sets where necessary.

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Nick Markowitz is a Trade Writer, an Electrician and an expert in the Security and Life Safety Markets. With over 35 years experience. Here in his personal blog you will find helpful technical tips as well as personal comments and life experiences. Nick has over 1500 articles he has published in many different magazines ,websites newspapers and other media on many different subjects

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